


At the Role Reversal

by silkstocking



Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: Bodyswap, M/M, Nashville Predators
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-01
Updated: 2018-01-01
Packaged: 2019-02-19 03:53:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,085
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13115433
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/silkstocking/pseuds/silkstocking
Summary: The first time Juuse realises something isn’t right is when he stumbles out of bed to go to the bathroom, eyes half closed and brain not really engaged yet, and faceplants.





	At the Role Reversal

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Guzmanasol](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Guzmanasol/gifts).



> In my mind, this exists in the same universe as Nadler's [Across the Room](http://archiveofourown.org/works/9858647) but you don't need to read that to understand this one.

The first time Juuse realises something isn’t right is when he stumbles out of bed to go to the bathroom, eyes half closed and brain not really engaged yet, and faceplants. Not just a little trip, but legitimately going from standing to face-down on the bedroom carpet.

“Fuck,” he says, and his voice comes out sounding weird. As he tries to gather his bearings, it slowly comes to him that he doesn’t remember the bedroom carpet being this colour. He rolls over with a grunt and swears again. This is Pekka’s bedroom. And Juuse’s naked. And there’s an ache in his side that he can’t remember getting, and he can't feel the ones he does remember getting. Just how much did he drink last night? He doesn't remember coming to Pekka’s place. He remembers having such a great game in Dallas, and celebrating with the guys after, and coming home after the flight to his own apartment. Alone.

“Pekka?” he tries tentatively, but there’s no answer and he can’t see anyone else in the bed when he forces himself into a sitting position. He looks down and yelps, scrambling backwards until his brain catches up with what he’s seeing and figures out that he can’t run away from his own body. His own body that’s _not_ his body.

He pushes himself to his feet, having to steady himself on the wall when he nearly faceplants again, and rushes over Pekka’s huge mirror to stare in growing horror at himself. Pekka Rinne looks back at him.

A phone rings somewhere. Juuse finds it on the nightstand, his own face smiling up at him from the screen. He swipes answer and says, “Pekka?”

Wow, his own voice sounds stupid on the phone, especially swearing like that. It’s going to be a really long day.

*

“We have to tell Coach,” is the first thing Pekka says to him when he lets himself into his own house using Juuse’s key and Juuse’s hands.

“What?” Juuse says. He almost springs up from his seat at the breakfast bar but remembers at the last second that he’s still having some… balance issues. “What do you mean, tell Coach? Don’t you know how to fix this?”

Pekka laughs. Juuse didn’t realise he was capable of sounding quite that hysterical. “No, I don’t know how to fix this. I don’t even know what this is.”

“Fuck,” Juuse says, with feeling.

“Someone in the organisation should know. Someone must have seen this before. They'll know what to do.”

Panic bubbles up in Juuse’s chest. “Please, Pekka. Don’t tell them. We can solve it. Please.”

“Juuse,” Pekka says, and it's so weird to see that combination sigh/eyeroll Pekka does when he's annoyed at him on the wrong face. “We have to tell them, kiddo. We have a game in three days and we can't play like this. And even before then, there's no way the team’s not going to notice.”

Juuse bristles at the nickname but he doesn't think pointing out he's currently the one in the 35 year old body is going to help. “They might not,” he says. 

“Why are you so against this?”

“I'm just scared,” Juuse says, voice small, “in case they think I did something to you, on purpose. I don't want to get traded. Or sent back to Milwaukee.”

Pekka’s expression in Juuse’s face goes strange and soft and he says, “Okay. We won't tell Coach yet. But if we can’t figure it out soon, we’ll have to.”

*

Pekka might have overestimated the general observantness level of the team, Juuse thinks. Two guys have already come up to “Pekka” to talk about the details of their next hike, but once Juuse starts remembering to answer to Pekka's name, all he has to do is smile and nod. Another wants to ask a question about Pekka’s team in the fantasy football league. And Matty talks Juuse’s ear off for ten minutes about on-ice communication, seemly without realising that he’s communicating off-ice with the wrong goalie.

“So, what do you think?” Matty finishes, looking expectantly at Juuse.

“Uh.” What would Pekka say? “Sure, Eky, that sounds good. You should talk it over with Juuse too.”

Matty looks confused but goes. It's Pekka’s problem to deal with now.

Juuse pulls on Pekka’s pads and Pekka’s skates and concentrates on figuring out how to tend goal with all this extra length to his limbs.

*

It's really weird, being in the wrong body. Nothing feels right. He has to hold a dick that's not his when he takes a piss. He's managed to stop wobbling when he walks but he's not used to towering over everyone in the room. His knees creak when he gets into butterfly and sometimes his shoulder clicks when he stretches, and practice leaves him with more aches than he's used to. He looks down at Pekka’s body and feels a newfound appreciation for the work that goes into it. That's the other thing: it's really weird being in a body you're attracted to. It's not like he's never seen Pekka naked before, but not usually from this perspective. Juuse spends two days in a state of heightened sexual confusion, but he has needs. He lies in Pekka’s bed, naked, and tries not to think too hard about what Pekka would say if he knew. He wraps his hand around his hard dick and thinks about all the times he imagined touching Pekka this way. He comes embarrassingly fast, and falls asleep wondering if Pekka did this in his body too.

*

By game day, they still haven't switched back.

“We have to let someone know,” Pekka says, but he hesitates when Coach asks them if everything is okay, and in the end, he doesn't say anything.

Max Lagacé skates by the spot where Juuse, as Pekka, is warming up, does a double take, and loops back around.

“Juuse?” he asks.

Juuse chokes a little. How the fuck could he tell that? They don’t even know each other all that well. Maybe this is some kind of French-Canadian mystic thing. After far too long a pause, Juuse says, “No? Uh. He’s over there.”

Max peers closely at him. “No, I’m pretty sure you’re Juuse. Don’t worry, I won’t tell. I know how this works.”

“You do?” Juuse wishes he did.

“Of course! I switched with Desrosiers a few times when we were on Texas.”

“You did?”

“Are you panicking?” Max says, laughing. “You sound like you’re panicking. It’s common, a goalie thing. I heard it happen to the Dallas goalies too last season, eh?”

“But how do we fix it?”

Something wavers in Max’s expression and then he makes a gesture kind of like he’s trying to tap his nose while wearing a glove and mask. It looks bizarre. “Ah, well. Maybe it work differently for Finns. You should ask your countrymen! Bye!”

He skates off over to where Pekka is running through Juuse’s stretching routine and watching them closely. Juuse stares after him, simultaneously cursing weird Frenchmen and really hoping Pekka has Kari Lehtonen’s number.

*

Juuse hates shootouts. He hates this whole fucking situation. And he really hates making Pekka look bad.

“You didn’t,” Pekka murmurs when Juuse expresses this to him later, curled up at opposite ends of Pekka’s sofa in front of Netflix that neither of them is really watching. The other guys had gone out with Subby and his family to jointly commiserate the loss and chirp him for losing to his baby brother, but Juuse had begged off and Pekka had, without comment, driven them both to his place.

But their usual post-loss ritual has lost some of its appeal. They haven’t really touched since this whole thing began; it’s felt too weird. Juuse finds himself missing the easy, casual touches he almost hadn’t noticed they used to share. He shifts Pekka’s stupidly long legs a little, until his socked feet are resting just centimetres from Pekka’s—Juuse’s—thigh. Pekka’s sideways expression looks kind of funny on Juuse’s face; clearly Juuse hadn’t been as stealthy as he thought. Pekka lifts the feet into his lap anyway, rubbing his thumb into Juuse’s arch and suddenly becoming very interested in Winona Ryder’s quest to get a monster out of her son.

That feels uncomfortably like some kind of metaphor. Juuse tries to shift his feet back, but Pekka’s grip is firm, and feels good, so he doesn't try too hard. He lets the repetitive motions lull him into a stupor, and doesn't think any more about the loss.

When the credits roll, Juuse sleepily remembers something. “Lagacé said Lehtonen or Niemi might know how to fix this.”

“They had this too?” Pekka sits up, suddenly alert, and lets Juuse’s feet fall off his lap. “Do you think Kari gave this to us somehow? Shit, where's my phone, I need to call him. Oh, damnit, give me your fingerprint first.”

Juuse unlocks Pekka’s phone and hands it over.

Pekka’s conversation starts off polite enough, and then he looks sideways at Juuse and leaves the room. He’s gone for so long that Juuse starts to think he might have run away. When he comes back, he seems cagey.

“What did he say?” Juuse asks.

Pekka just shakes his head. “Completely unhelpful.”

“What? Oh god, you mean they couldn’t fix it? Is that why Niemi’s season—”

“No, no, not that, they got back to normal. But what he suggested was so stupid that I think he must be messing with me.”

“Can’t we try it anyway? Just in case? No one would know but us and surely it can’t hurt?” Juuse pleads.

“He said they kept switching back and forth and back and forth all the time, so maybe this was different,” Pekka says, then he sighs and shifts his feet, a characteristic gesture that looks odd in Juuse’s body. Juuse waits him out. “True love’s kiss, he said. That’s what solved it.”

Juuse feels a mad urge to giggle. “Oh, is that all? We have to find our true loves?”

“I told you, he was messing with me,” Pekka says, but Juuse’s pretty sure he recognises the expression on Pekka’s face as guilt.

“There’s something you’re not telling me,” he says.

Pekka sighs again. “Fine, you’re right. There is. It’s just… it wasn't you that did something to me. It was me who did something to you. I think I… caused this, or wished it. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you earlier.”

Juuse frowns. “What do you mean? You wished we could swap?”

“I was jealous,” Pekka says, looking down. “People keep saying I’m getting old, that I should step back and let you have the starter role. I just thought how great it would be to have the body of a twenty-two year old again but know what I know now.”

Juuse pulls him in for a hug, resting his chin on the top of Pekka’s head. “It’s okay. I don’t care if you caused it or not, but we should at least try to fix it.”

Pekka sighs a little in Juuse’s arms. “Well, that’s the thing. He said they didn’t go out and find their true loves. The kiss was between the two of them.”

“Pekka, I—”

“No, I know, it’s a foolish suggestion,” Pekka says. “I’m not going to force you to do that.”

Juuse puts a finger under Pekka’s chin and tilts his head up so they can look at each other. “It, uh. I meant to say that it wouldn’t exactly be a hardship to kiss you. Uh. I mean, only if you wanted to. But, yeah. I’ve… thought about it. That. You.”

Pekka looks up at Juuse. For a long moment he seems struck dumb, a clear struggle raging in his eyes. Then he stands up on his toes. Juuse’s eyes flutter closed.

The kiss, when it comes, can barely be called that. It's just a chaste brush of lips, but when Juuse opens his eyes, he’s looking up at Pekka.

“Damn. I was getting used to looming over people,” he says.

Pekka laughs delightedly and pulls Juuse into a bone-crushing hug. “I can’t believe that worked,” he says.

“We should send a fruit basket.”

“No way. I’m not letting him know he was right.”

Juuse looks up, feeling suddenly shy. “Do you think he was right? About, uh, about the true love?”

“I’m willing to find out,” Pekka says, and this time when he kisses Juuse it’s not chaste at all.

 


End file.
